The Long Wait
by InfinityStar
Summary: She loved him and hated him with the same passion. Now, she saw her chance as he watched in misery while the woman he loved married another man.
1. A Study From the Shadows

**A/N: HayleyMaree2000 asked to see something from Nicole's perspective, so here it is!**

**As usual, they do belong to Dick Wolf, except for Maggie...**

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_Hatred is one long wait. ---Rene Maran_

She couldn't believe it. Were it not for the accompanying photograph, she would have vehemently denied it could be her. She had no idea why she'd decided to flip through the social pages, as if she cared who was getting married or having babies in the Big Apple, but she felt a certain satisfaction as she re-read the wedding announcement of Richard Waters and Alexandra Eames.

As she pulled out a worn briefcase and a pair of scissors, she thought about Bobby. What must he be feeling, losing her to someone else? Oh, she knew. He tried to hide it, and he was probably successful in keeping it from the rest of the world, but even if she never truly felt love, she knew it when she saw it, and she saw it in him.

She clipped the announcement and placed it in a file from the briefcase that was labeled simply "Bobby." Every mention in the paper, every photograph, every record she could find was added to this file. Taking out her pocket calendar, she opened it to the month of March and circled the twenty-fifth. She was going to New York.

* * *

She looked out the window of the plane and thought about the Big Apple. The only reason she ever came back any more was Bobby Goren. She took great delight in torturing him, in watching him squirm under her thumb, in staying one half-step ahead of the great detective. And she wondered...did he feel the same warm thrill deep inside that she did whenever she saw him? Did he have the same surge of hot desire when he was close to her? 

She laughed bitterly. Not when Eames was nearby, he didn't. How could he possibly desire her when he was so much in love with his partner? She pictured the petite blonde detective in her mind and had no doubt that she tortured Bobby's dreams. She was equally certain that she herself was relegated to his nightmares. And yet...she could not help the raw passion that welled up in her every time she saw him, every time she thought about him. If she had any capacity for love, she would have loved him. But she didn't. So lust and passion were all that were left to her. Lust and passion, along with fury that he did not feel the same way, intense jealousy for the one woman who did have his heart, and deep hatred for her, not only because she did have his heart, but because she was turning him away. She knew Bobby Goren. His heart would never belong to any other woman but Alexandra Eames.

She watched the city skyline as the plane came in on its final approach. She could have settled in nicely here and been content except for the fact that she was wanted by the NYPD, wanted by Bobby Goren, only not in the way she'd prefer to be wanted by him. She had a definite preference for women in her bed, but she was not above seducing any man if it would get her what she wanted. But Bobby would not be seduced by her. He played the game, but he never fell for her manipulations. Oh, she'd gotten him good with Croyden, but then he and Eames had gotten her back. Eames was always there to steady him when he faltered and to catch him when he fell. But Eames was getting married, and she wondered: who would be there for him now?

* * *

She hid in the shadows during the ceremony, watching him for any reaction. There was none. Of course he would withdraw. That was how he dealt with pain. Later, at the reception, she watched him avoid the happy couple. He stayed off by himself and she was debating about making her presence known. If his level of distress was great enough, she very well might be able to finally get him into bed with her. She had just decided that was what she was going to do when someone approached him and sat down with him. She could tell he was a cop, and she recognized him from seeing him in the Major Case squad room, but she didn't know him. Then Eames approached him and the other cop left. 

She felt jealousy well up from deep inside as Eames pulled up a chair and sat close to him. He leaned toward her and kissed her cheek. She talked with him for a short while, touching his face with obvious affection. Even from her distant vantage point, she could tell there was something between the partners. Married to another, yet she still carried a burning torch for the man she called partner. She felt blind fury clench at her gut when Eames kissed him, remained close as she talked to him and then stood and, with a final caress, she walked away. She had not thought it in Eames to be cruel to him, but maybe she truly did not know how he felt about her. After all, she was just a cop, not a student of human behavior and psychology like her partner. Bobby could read people. She doubted Eames had that same ability. She did not hate Eames for loving Bobby. She hated her for rendering him incapable of loving anyone else.

Once Eames was gone, he hit the bar hard, and she saw an opportunity. Sober, she never had a chance with him. But given a little time...and a lot of alcohol...she smiled a wicked smile. She didn't care how it came about, but she was now confident that before day's end, she would have Bobby Goren.

He wandered out onto a balcony with his drink. She'd lost count of how many he'd put away so far, but he wasn't ready for her yet. She watched him take off his jacket and drape it over the back of a chair. Then he pulled off his tie and folded it neatly, and he collapsed into another chair. Setting the tie on the arm of the chair, he leaned over and picked up his drink, watching the sky as he nursed it. She was mildly discouraged that he was slowing his consumption; she hated waiting for what she wanted when it was right in front of her.

Then that other cop made another appearance, with a woman this time. They sat down with him and talked for a while. To her great consternation and deep disappointment, they remained with him for the rest of the night. Bobby continued drinking; it was very clear that this wedding had been interminably difficult for him. As evening turned into night, his friend took him home.

She was disappointed, but it wouldn't last. She would be back, and he would be hers. Eames was out of the picture; she belonged to another man. Let him adjust to that for awhile and then she would come back to New York and make him hers.

_tbc..._


	2. Shaken By A Crime

Deakins came out of his office and approached Goren and Eames at their desks. "We have a body over in the Village. Councilman's daughter. Treat this one with kid gloves, guys."

He handed the address to Eames and watched the partners leave. He didn't miss the hand that Goren lightly rested on her back as he let her enter the elevator first, and he smiled to himself. After Eames had returned from her honeymoon, Goren had acted like she was a stranger. He didn't have any idea where he stood with her. It had taken more than six months and a lot of gentle work on Eames' part to draw him out and settle him back into the familiar friendship they had shared before she got married. But the captain still noticed something not-quite-right with his star detective. His Mondays certainly seemed to be off. Perhaps it was just his imagination, but in any event, he would leave it to Eames and Logan to straighten him out, if indeed anything was wrong. He had no idea that Eames was unaware of anything seriously amiss with her partner, and Logan was struggling to save the man from the path of self-destruction he was carelessly wandering down.

Eames parked the SUV amid the marked cars in front of the brownstone that was their destination. Goren stopped and looked around after he got out of the car. There was something familiar about the neighborhood, but he dismissed it. He could probably find something familiar about every neighborhood in the city. He followed Eames into the building and up the stairs to the second floor, fighting an overpowering feeling of deja vu.

A detective from the local precinct met them at the door. "The ME puts the time of death sometime between midnight and noon on Monday." It was Thursday. "We called you guys because she's Councilman Vogler's daughter."

Eames frowned. "Three days and no one noticed she was missing?"

"The councilman said she calls him every Wednesday night, and when she didn't call last night, he got concerned. He waited until this morning and then he called us to check on her."

"No one missed her at work?"

"He said she's between jobs. He's been handling her expenses. The body's in here."

They went in to the second floor apartment. Eames shivered. "Someone cranked up the air conditioner."

Her body lay in the middle of the kitchen floor. His eyes were riveted to her as soon as they entered the room. He stopped and swallowed hard. Eames sensed that he had stopped and she turned to look at him. She had never known a crime scene to shake him up. Ever. "Bobby?"

He shook his head and yanked a pair of gloves from his pocket, pulling them on with a snap. She was a pretty woman, tall, slender. Her long dark hair was arranged around her head like a halo before it draped over her shoulders. He circled the body twice before he dropped to a knee beside her. "Strangulation..." he said quietly, gently pushing her hair back from her neck. His fingers traced the ligature mark and he had to consciously still the tremor in his hand when it hovered near a bruise at the side of her neck where it joined the curve of her shoulder.

Eames leaned over to look at the bruise. "A bruise from the perp's finger? His thumb maybe?"

"Uh, no. I don't think so." He moved his hand, deliberately redirecting her attention to the downward angle of the ligature mark. "Um, whoever did this was shorter than she was...or at an angle lower than her shoulders."

He examined the body, clad only in underwear, and he had to suppress another tremor, this one stirred by a memory. Nancy... her name was Nancy... _Oh_, _God_... a councilman's daughter... he'd had no idea...

As they headed back to the SUV, giving the medical examiner leave to remove the body, Eames asked, "Is something wrong, Bobby?"

Still shaken, he replied, "No. Why?"

"You just act like something's wrong...something more than just this murder."

He climbed into the passenger seat and rubbed his forehead. How the hell could he tell her _this_? No, he couldn't. _Not_ _this_. He just waved a hand in the air. "It's nothing, Eames. Let's go back to the squad room."

As they pulled away, a petite figure stepped from the shadows of the doorway in which she'd been hidden. She'd seen his shaken look, and she smiled. With a satisfied smirk on her features, Nicole Wallace walked away from the brownstone where she had taken the life of Nancy Vogler a few brief hours after Bobby had left her apartment before dawn Monday morning.


	3. Standing Accountable

When Eames left for the day Friday afternoon, Goren remained behind, camped out in the conference room with the accumulated evidence from Nancy Vogler's murder. Pinned to the corkboard hanging on the wall, the autopsy photos were lined up beside the _in_ _situ_ crime scene photos of the body. His elbow resting on the table, forefinger against his mouth, Goren sat studying the pictures.

He didn't react when the door opened, or when someone sat down at the table until he heard a soft intake of breath and a quietly muttered, "Holy shit...she looks like..."

"She is."

"How the hell did she end up on Rodgers' slab?"

"I...I don't know."

"When was she killed?"

"Monday morning."

"And you...?"

He turned to look at Logan with tired eyes. "She was alive when I left her, Mike. That much I know for certain." He shifted in the chair. "After I got dressed, she woke up...said good bye. I didn't kill her."

"But you were the last person to see her alive."

"No, I wasn't. Whoever killed her was."

Logan ran his hand over his hair. "What did Eames say about it?"

"About what?"

Logan stared at him. "You didn't tell her? You were with a friggin' murder victim a couple of hours before she died, and you didn't tell your partner?" He scrubbed his face with both hands. "What does the trace show?"

"Not much. Uh, DNA isn't back yet."

Logan shuffled through the papers and pulled out the victim's autopsy. "Aw, fuck. Tell me this is the killer's...It's not, is it?"

"Th-there were no signs she was raped."

"The sample's degraded. You think they'll be able to extract anything?"

Goren shrugged. "I don't know."

"So tell me exactly how you plan to keep this from her."

"It's my investigation."

Again Logan stared at him. "Please don't tell me you're thinking of withholding or misrepresenting evidence to your damn partner. Have you lost your mind?"

"I-I haven't decided what to do."

Logan smacked his shoulder. "You tell her, idiot. You can't keep this from her. You _know_ that. Please don't go stupid on me." He knew from the slump of Goren's shoulders that he realized there was no getting around it. "She can't expect you to be celibate, you know."

"No...it's not that."

"No, of course not. This is about your reckless behavior. You're afraid she's going to find out what you've been doing."

Goren frowned. "I'm not ashamed of anything."

"What then? You think she'll be disappointed that you aren't pining away for her?"

"Why would she think that? She...look, I seriously doubt she has any interest in what I do during my off time. Eames has never been interested in my social life."

Logan gave him a look that said he believed otherwise, if only because Eames _was_ concerned about his happiness. That, though, was a complex issue that made Logan's head hurt, so he moved the conversation away from the topic. "Tell me: just when did your brain go away on vacation?"

Finally, Goren looked at him. "What are you talking about?"

Logan considered his answer carefully. "When she got married, you retreated someplace where no one could reach you, because she hurt you, even though it was something she never meant to do. But...you are still her best friend, and she's worked hard to remind you of that. I think she finally got through to you when she joined us to play pool on your birthday. She showed you that you were still important to her. Now...well, now you have to show her that you trust her. You gotta tell her about this, Bobby, before she finds it in the evidence. And she will find it."

"Suppose there's nothing to find?"

"You're just kidding yourself, man. Unless you can tell me how you pulled off going home with this woman, spending the night and sleeping with her, and not leaving any trace that's going to come back to you. You know you have to tell her. If you don't, when she finds out she's going to kill you. Or worse."

"Worse? What's worse than what I've been going through?"

"First of all, what you've been going through you've been doing to yourself and you know it. Second of all, you keep evidence from her and you are going to destroy her trust in you, and with that goes your partnership. Deakins sticks you with me, and I think we'd kill him."

"My partnership... Th-that's all I have left."

"Then don't throw it away by being stupid. You have to tell her, man...before it bites you in the ass, 'cause then it'll be too late."

Goren looked back at the photos on the wall. Logan was right. He had stepped into this on his own and now he had to stand accountable. "I-uh, I'll see you later, Mike."

"Nine o'clock?"

"Yeah."

"Bobby?" Goren stopped at the door but did not turn. Logan went on. "She doesn't have to find out about Sunday nights. All she has to know is that you were with this one woman. You don't have to tell her that you don't really know her. If that makes it any easier..."

"It doesn't." He opened the door to step through, then turned to look at Logan. "Thanks, Mike."

He left the conference room, and Logan shifted his gaze to the wall. Sunday night, they'd met at a little mid-town bar, like they had done every week since Eames came back from Bermuda. And just like he did almost every week, Goren left with a woman, too drunk to be picky and too hurt to care. Logan hated Sunday nights. Sure, he often went home with someone as well, but for him, it was just a good time. Goren wasn't looking for a good time. He just wanted the pain to go away for a little while. Logan wondered if it worked for him, but he never asked. Some questions were better left unanswered.

He sifted through the crime scene reports and the autopsy results. The coincidence between this woman's death and her premortem activity made him uneasy. The skeptical side of him would not accept that it was coincidence and he knew Goren would agree with him, if he just thought about it. What the connection was, though, he had no idea.

_Goren_...He sighed as he thought of his friend. God, he was a lot of work. The easiest thing for Logan to do would be to walk away and forget it, let Goren self-destruct and be done with it. But he couldn't do that. It was too late. At the wedding, he'd felt sorry for the man; he'd been so miserable. He wasn't sure exactly what had happened, or when, but he really cared about him now, and he couldn't just leave him to the sharks. Friends didn't do that, and there was no turning back now. Goren was his friend.

* * *

He heard the doorbell sound inside the house and he waited. The door opened and Waters glared at him. "What do you want, Goren?"

"I need to talk to my partner."

"Maybe she doesn't want to talk to you."

"It's about a case, Waters."

Waters looked at him for a minute, then pushed the door open further and let Goren in. "Alex," he called. "It's for you."

Eames came down the stairs and Goren caught his breath. She had changed into a loose white shirt and a pair of jeans, and she looked stunning. Well, he was stunned, anyway. But he shook it off before Waters noticed. Eames frowned. "What's wrong, Bobby?"

"I have to talk to you about the Vogler case."

She motioned to the doorway off to his left. "Let's go into the living room."

He stepped aside and followed her through the doorway, sitting uneasily on the couch. He set his portfolio on the coffee table. His unrest made Eames nervous. "Do you want something to drink?"

He shook his head. "No, thanks."

"So what did you find?"

"Uh, I didn't find anything. But there's something...something you need to know."

Waters came into the room and conversation ceased. Eames looked at him. "Is something wrong, Ricky?"

His eyes darted from his wife to her partner and back. "You know what's wrong," he complained.

Goren wasn't stupid. He grabbed his portfolio and stood. "Look, Eames, I don't want to cause any problems. I do have something I need to tell you, but if it has to wait, that's fine. It can wait. Just remember that I was here."

"Sit down, Bobby." She ushered her husband out of the room and angrily hissed, "Grow the hell up, Ricky. He's not going to attack me on the living room couch. He has never attacked me anywhere. Now go upstairs and find something to do. Let me talk to Bobby and then he'll be on his way. This is _work_, Ricky. Now quit being an ass and let me talk to my partner."

Waters studied her face and, without a word, turned and went upstairs. Eames returned to the living room. "Sorry about that."

"Don't be. I'm the one who should apologize. I should have called and met you somewhere." He studied his hands. "I-I don't know why I just came out. That was wrong."

She sat beside him on the couch and gave him a playful nudge. "Cut it out. If it's important, you did the right thing."

"I don't know how important it is. It's just...pertinent."

"Well? Let's hear it."

"I...uh, the victim...I, uh, I know her." Eames said nothing so he went on, uncertain. "I...um...I was with her Sunday night." He rubbed a hand over the back of his neck. "Sh-she was alive when I left her...but...I guess you, uh, you need to know that if they can get any...any DNA from that sample...well, it's likely to, uh, be mine."

Eames just looked at him in silence. He once again shifted uncomfortably, studying his hands as he refused to look at her. He did not want to see what was in her eyes.

"Why didn't you tell me yesterday?"

"I didn't _want_ to tell you now, but I knew I had to. That's why I'm here." He raised his eyes toward her without moving his head. "I had no idea she was going to be murdered, Eames."

"Of course you didn't. But you'll have to submit DNA for exclusionary purposes."

He nodded. "I know."

"And you are going to answer to Deakins for why you didn't say anything sooner."

Again he nodded. He reached for his portfolio from the couch beside him and drew it onto his lap. "I-I'm sorry. I know I should have said something."

"Why didn't you?"

"I...I didn't know how to."

She was quiet for a long moment before sliding her hand onto his where it fidgeted with the edge of the portfolio. "Okay. We'll deal with it. Take it easy this weekend and we'll work on it Monday."

He stood up almost too quickly. "S-sorry to have bothered you at home, Eames. I...have a good weekend."

He turned abruptly and headed for the door as quickly as he could without overtly appearing to rush. By the time she got to the front door, he was already nearly to his car. She watched him leave and sighed softly. Bobby always made things more difficult than they had to be. With a sad shake of her head, she closed the front door.


	4. Victim Number Two

She sat in a dark corner of the bar, quietly watching the activity around her. She was very pleased with herself. She knew from watching Bobby at the scene of Nancy Vogler's murder that he had been badly shaken. She had proven to herself that she could still get to him. She knew what it took to get to Bobby Goren.

As if in tune with her thoughts, he came into the bar with his friend from the squad. Wallace smiled. She would never have pegged him for a creature of habit, but he did seem to like this smoky little bar. She had been stalking him for months and Sundays always seemed to bring him here.

It was well past midnight when she followed him from the bar, measuring up the woman who was with him. This was turning into a nightmare for him, but she was enjoying herself immensely. It hadn't been difficult to convince Nancy Vogler to let her in to the apartment, and then she'd easily seduced the woman, drugged her and, before the drugs had rendered her unconscious, strangled the life from her.

She'd arranged the body, left the apartment and kept up her surveillance until the police were finally called to the scene. She had thought about calling it in herself, but Bobby was thorough. He would listen to any 911 call or anonymous tip and he would know her voice. This one, she would have to be certain would be found sooner. DNA evidence was important...to her. She smiled as she followed the couple into the subway.

If she was anything, Nicole Wallace was patient. She waited and watched as the lights in the woman's apartment went out. She would give almost anything to watch the goings on, to see Bobby in action, in spite of his inebriation. But this was not the time. She would see that soon enough—when she got him into her bed.

It was just after four when he emerged from the building and headed down the street toward the subway. He was a lot steadier than she expected him to be, making her wonder if he'd really been as drunk as she'd thought. Ah, well, it really didn't matter. When he was gone, she crossed the street and entered the apartment building.

* * *

Goren was already at his desk when Eames arrived Monday morning. She sat down at her desk and waited for him to look up at her. Finally, he did. "Good morning, Eames," he said quietly. 

"Are you feeling any better?"

"About Nancy's death? No, of course not."

"No, I mean about what you perceive to be your role in it."

He looked down at his hands where they rested on the desk, and Eames huffed in annoyance. "Look at me, Goren." He hesitated, but he finally looked at her. She continued, "Don't carry the burden of this murder, Bobby. You know it's not your fault."

"I-I know. But I still feel badly. Sh-she didn't deserve that."

"What victim does?" She hesitated when he looked away. She was being harsh, and he really didn't need that. She changed her tone. "How long have you known her?"

"Not long."

"I am sorry, Bobby."

He looked back at her. She really meant that. She was sorry that he'd lost someone she perceived to be important to him. "Thank you, Eames."

"Do you want me to go with you to tell Deakins?"

He shook his head. There was no reason for her to have any part in that. "No. I can face the music on my own."

"Something tells me it won't be music you'll be hearing."

She felt a little relief when a small smile touched his mouth. As the lunch hour drew near, he screwed up his courage to talk to the captain. "I, uh, I guess I'd better get this over with. What are you doing for lunch?"

"Oh, I'm...meeting someone. Sorry, Bobby. I forgot. I'll see you after lunch."

A half-smile crooked his mouth. "If I'm still here. Deakins may chew me up and spit me out."

Eames smiled. "He might."

"I'm glad you didn't."

"Don't think it didn't occur to me. But I know you're a lot harder on yourself than I could ever be."

He knew she was right and there was nothing he could say to reply. "Enjoy your lunch, Eames."

He headed to the captain's office and went inside. When he came out, she was gone.

* * *

One o'clock came and went, progressing toward two, and Goren started getting restless. Logan stopped at his desk as he headed for the breakroom to refill his coffee cup. He read Goren's restlessness and interpreted it correctly. He was getting to know the man well, and he wasn't entirely sure if that was a good thing or not. On some level it almost frightened him. He gently cuffed Goren's shoulder. "Relax. So she's a little late." 

"She's not usually late." She was just meeting someone. Suppose something had gone wrong? He had no idea who she was supposed to be meeting. He should have asked. What was wrong with him?

"Take a pill, Goren. What the hell is up with you?"

"I don't know. She just seems…out of sorts lately."

"You worry too much. Look, there she is now, safe and sound."

Goren shot him an annoyed look as he went on his way to the coffee pot. Eames sat down at her desk, looking a little pale. Goren frowned. "What's wrong?"

She shook her head. "Not now, Bobby."

Her manner told him she was not willing to discuss it, and he let the matter drop because she asked him to, but his anxiety increased and so did his restlessness, which annoyed her. "Will you sit still?" she snapped, halfway through the afternoon.

"Sorry," he muttered.

When the day came to an end, she left right away, which was also unusual for her. Goren knew something was troubling her. She hadn't asked how it went with Deakins, and he didn't want to add to her troubles by recounting the uncomfortable exchange. Deakins had been understandably furious, and Goren was in deep trouble. But that became secondary to him after Eames came back from lunch. Logan came over and leaned against Goren's desk. "What's up with her?"

"She won't tell me."

"That's not good."

No, it wasn't. Something was bothering her, and he knew he wouldn't be able to settle down until he knew what.

* * *

Goren was surprised to see Eames at her desk when he came in the next morning. She almost never got there before he did. He dropped into his chair and looked at her, concerned. She looked upset, and he could tell she had been crying. His stomach flipped, and he fought down the anger that began to form. "Eames?" 

"Let's go get some breakfast, Bobby."

"Okay." He didn't know what else to say.

They walked along the sidewalk away from the headquarters building. Letting her take the initiative, he remained silent as he watched her. "Stop looking at me, Goren."

He looked away, watching the sidewalk, not commenting on her snippiness. "I'm sorry," she said after awhile. "I just…I'm not sure how I feel right now."

"Do you want to talk about it?"

She noticed how tentative he was. "Yes, I do." She was quiet for another half a block. "I went to the doctor at lunch yesterday. That's why I was late. Bobby, I'm pregnant."

"Oh," was all he said. _Pregnant?_ They had crossed the street before he noticed she was crying. He stepped over to stand against a nearby building, out of pedestrian traffic, gently guiding her along with him. He pulled her into his arms and held her. He didn't have to ask what was wrong. It had to be her husband. She had always wanted children of her own and had loved being pregnant with her nephew. It wasn't the pregnancy that had her upset. He didn't know what else to do but hold her. So that's all he did.

* * *

_Pregnant_...Eames was pregnant. His head was swimming. She was pregnant with _Ricky's_ child. He left his car in the parking garage and headed for home on foot. He needed time to think, and his thoughts never strayed to his own problems. All he could think about was Eames. He was no fool. He knew what this meant. It meant she was now tied to the man she married with a bond that was stronger than her word. She was bound to him by the life they had created. She truly was lost to him now. 

_Have faith...don't lose hope. Shit._ Faith and hope were for fools and suckers. But what was he. A fool? Of course he was. He couldn't help loving her, needing her, wanting her in a way that was about as far from pure as one could get. He was a fool for loving her, and he couldn't help that. He would always love her. And he couldn't help but resent this child that now bound her to Ricky because he knew his partner and he knew how she felt about parenthood. She would stay with Ricky.

But what did he expect? Ricky was her husband. Who else would she have a child with? God, he had to get over this. In his mind, he could hear Logan's voice, saying words Logan himself had never spoken to him._ Face it, big guy. She's not yours. Never was, never will be. Get over it and move on with your life._

What to make of that? Mike Logan, the voice of reason in his mind. Logan would get a big kick out of that. But better Mike Logan than William Goren, Sr. At least with Mike, there was never any judgment. Mike simply called it as he saw it. Whoever's voice it was, it was right. Eames would never belong to him. But he needed time to get used to that concept. Eight months wasn't long enough. Maybe this pregnancy would do it. Maybe this pregnancy would be the very thing to finally take her away from him. He could see her leaving the force to be a full-time mother. His gut clenched. Now what was he going to do?

* * *

He rolled over and grabbed the phone. "Goren." Silence. "Hello?" 

A male voice gave him an address and the line went dead. He frowned and looked at the receiver as though it had a mind of its own. Grabbing a pen, he wrote down the address, which was vaguely familiar, though he couldn't explain why. He got out of bed and dressed. A brief urge to call his partner hit him, but he forced it down. Until he knew what this was about, he was not going to call her. She had enough trouble with her husband because of him. Besides, she was pregnant and she needed her rest if she could get it.

As he left the apartment, he remembered that his car was still at 1PP. _Shit_. He again thought about calling Eames, but decided against it. If he got her up because of some stupid prank, he'd be making it up to her for weeks. So he hit a different speed dial button. When a muffled voice said, _What the hell do you want, Goren? Have you even bothered to look at the clock?_

"No, I didn't actually. Get up. I'll be there in ten."

_What the hell for?_

"I need to borrow your car."

_What's wrong with yours?_

"Yours is closer. I left mine at work."

_What'd you do a bonehead thing like that for? _

"I had some thinking to do."

_So you left your car at work? Never mind. Don't explain. Isn't there anyone else you can bother?_

"Not at the moment."

_How do I get so lucky?_

"See you in a few."

He closed the phone and slid it back into his pocket.

Just under ten minutes later, Logan pulled open his door before Goren had a chance to knock. "Is this really necessary?" he asked, keys in hand.

"You don't have to come along."

"My car. Where are we going?" Goren handed him the paper with the scribbled address on it. "Okay, more important, then, why are we going there?"

"Because I got a weird phone call."

"Goren, if I reacted seriously to every weird phone call I got, I'd have two bookcases full of old encyclopedias and at least three STDs."

"Either give me the keys or get your jacket."

"Okay, fine. I want to go on record, though. I think you're being an idiot."

"Noted. And my reply is you're a bigger idiot because you're going with me."

"And why does Eames get to sleep in?"

"Because I have no idea what this is about. Firstly, she has enough trouble with Ricky because of me. Secondly, you're a lot closer."

"Remind me to move."

He followed Goren out into the hall and they headed for the car.

* * *

Logan slid the car into the center of four empty parking spaces in front of an old apartment building. "Okay, we're here. Now wh..." he stopped in midword at the look on Goren's face. In silence, he watched his friend get out of the car. This couldn't be good. He climbed out of the car and strolled around to the sidewalk. "What is it?" 

"I-I think I'll need to call Eames after all. I, uh, I was just here, Mike...Sunday night."

"No. Please tell me this is all a joke. Please." Goren did not reply. "Let's at least check it out before we piss off your partner's husband. You remember the apartment?"

Goren nodded. "Five."

"After you."

They found apartment five on the second floor at the back of the building. Goren knocked. "Cindy?"

No answer. He pressed one hand against the door and gave a firm push. The door opened. Without hesitation, he pulled a pair of gloves from his jacket and snapped them on. Logan followed suit, and they entered the dark apartment. Five minutes later, Goren was placing a call to his partner and Logan was on the line with central dispatch, requesting for CSU to be sent to their location to process a murder scene. Then they flipped for who would call Deakins. Logan lost the flip.

* * *

Eames entered the bedroom quietly. She had spent the last two nights in the spare bedroom because Ricky was being a jerk about the pregnancy, acting as though she had gone and gotten pregnant without him. _Bastard_. 

She pulled a shirt and jacket from the closet and grabbed a pair of jeans from the dresser. "Alex? What are you doing?"

"Getting some clothes, unless you would rather I show up at a crime scene in my pajamas."

"Crime scene?"

"Yes. I just got called out. Go back to sleep, Ricky."

"He called, didn't he?"

"Since he was called before me, yes. This is not a conspiracy, you know. People are not being murdered so I can rendezvous with Goren. I'll see you after work."

Without another word, she grabbed a pair of shoes and left the room. Hastily, she got dressed and left the house. With a soft sigh, she swallowed her grief that her baby's father refused to share in her own joy of the impending birth, six months away. As she started the car, she let her mind wander. Backing out of the driveway, she found herself wondering what Goren thought about the upcoming birth. And then she tried to tell herself that it didn't matter. He was just her partner. But she couldn't get away from the fact that it did matter...because Bobby was more than just her partner. He was her closest friend and that made him important to her. What he thought did matter, and she was counting on him to make her feel better about this. Maybe that was unfair of her, but she couldn't help it. When the circumstances of her life failed her, he was often the only one who could turn it around for her. There were few things in life that she truly needed, and her gentle partner was at the top of that list.


	5. An Unsettling Plan

Eames entered the apartment and accepted the gloves her partner held up to her. She studied the body, laying prostrate on the kitchen floor, just like... She chased the thought away. It couldn't be related.

"What do we know about her?"

Goren answered without looking up from his examination of the body. "Her name is Cindy Thorton. She's an accountant."

"Who reported her missing?"

"Uh, no one. An anonymous call gave only this address."

She glanced at Logan, wondering why he was there. "What happened to her?"

"Strangulation."

She walked around to the side of the body opposite Goren and, squatting, she moved the victim's hair to reveal the ligature marks, which were angled downward. Tall, slender, long, dark hair...very much like Nancy Vogler. "Is there something else I need to know?" she asked, her voice subdued.

Still he would not look at her, but he nodded. And she knew. She sighed heavily. _Another one_. "Bobby..."

"Not here, Eames."

"Does Logan know?"

"Yes."

"Of course he does."

With a dark frown, Goren finally looked at her. He opened his mouth to say something, but this was neither the time nor the place. Snapping his mouth shut, he returned his attention to the victim. Logan remained off to the side, watching the other two detectives work in an uncomfortable silence, and he wondered what was wrong. But he kept quiet and stood by in case he was needed. This was not his case, and he wasn't comfortable stepping in unless invited. Goren seemed fine with his presence, but there was something in the way Eames had looked at him that told him to stay out of the way. For once, he listened to the little voice of caution that his brain sometimes threw at him.

When they were done at the crime scene, the three of them left the building while CSU finished up and the medical examiner removed the body. Logan asked, "You need a ride to the squad, Bobby?"

Before Goren could answer, Eames said, "He has a ride, thanks, Mike. We'll see you later."

Logan looked at her, wondering at the chill in her voice. He raised his hands and backed off. "Okay, fine. See you later."

As he headed off to his car, his mind searched for what he'd done wrong. He wasn't surprised to come up empty. It happened all too often that he couldn't figure out what he'd done to piss off a woman. Some things never changed.

Goren slid into the passenger seat of her car and remained silent, struggling to get a handle on an anger he didn't exactly understand. Eames was also angry, and he didn't get that either. It wasn't like he'd killed the woman, even though he seemed to somehow be involved, thanks to this killer. She drove in silence for several blocks before she finally said, "Why didn't you call me?"

He was confused. "I did call you."

"But you called Logan first."

"That was before I knew it was a crime scene. I needed a ride because my car is still at work."

"But you didn't call me. You should have. _I'm_ your partner, Bobby."

He bit back his reply and remained silent for a minute, trying not to take out his frustration on her. "Eames," he finally said. "First of all, I cause you enough grief with your husband, just by being your partner." His voice became softer. "And second of all, you're pregnant. I'm not going to get you out of bed without a good reason. I don't..." He stopped himself. _I don't need you that badly..._but he did. The only problem was that her marriage, and now this baby, took her beyond his reach. "I had no idea it was what it turned out to be when I called Mike. He lives a lot closer to me than you do."

"He..._is_...a lot closer to you these days."

He lost his temper at that. She was jealous because he had a friend to turn to other than her? She wasn't jealous of Lewis or his other friends; why Mike? She stopped at a red light on the next block and he got out of the car without a word, slamming the door and walking off in the opposite direction. He heard her call to him, and he ignored her. She wasn't being fair, but he was not going to take his anger out on her. So he walked away. By the time she got around the next block and came back to look for him, he was gone.

* * *

Logan was puzzled when Eames arrived at the squad room alone. He waited a good twenty minutes, and when Goren didn't show up, he approached her desk. Holding his hands up in a gesture of surrender, he said "Truce?" 

"Don't be an ass, Mike. I'm sorry. You didn't deserve that."

He sat down at Goren's desk. "You want to tell me what that was all about?"

"I don't know. I guess I just feel...left out."

He frowned. "Left out? Left out of what?"

"His life."

Logan sighed. He had a funny feeling he was inadvertently caught in the middle of something, and yet, it didn't bother him as much as he thought that maybe it should have. And why? Because he had found out, over the last eight months, that he really did like Goren and he enjoyed being his friend...most of the time. "Don't you think you kind of left him behind when you got married? What do you expect from him? He has to get on with his life, Alex." _Such that it is right now..._ "He's walking a tightrope here—caught between his desire to keep you in his life and his reluctance to cause any problems in your marriage. Have you missed the fact that Bobby isn't exactly Ricky's favorite person?"

"That's something he should leave for me to deal with."

"Whatever. That's for you and him to work out. But don't begrudge him his own life. That's really unfair. You're married now. He _can't_ include you in a big part of his life." He leaned over the desk and lowered his voice. "I swear, I am not trying to interfere in anything between the two of you. I'm just trying to be his friend."

He got up and went back to his desk. He didn't feel it was his place to tell her how her partner was struggling, how much he _needed_ a friend who could be there for him when she couldn't, a friend he could confide in when he couldn't confide in her. Logan was fully aware that no one would ever be more to Goren than she was. But there was a secondary need in his life that Logan was able to meet. He didn't pretend to understand him, because a lot of the time, he didn't. But he accepted him, he was honest with him, and he stood by him, and that was what Goren needed. Whether Eames liked it or not, Goren needed his friendship, and the sooner she realized that, and accepted it, the better.

She looked up when he dropped down into his chair. She didn't say anything; she just watched him. He scrubbed his face with both hands, and she couldn't help noticing how haggard he looked. Finally she said, "I'm sorry, Bobby. I...I'm not being fair to you. I just...I feel left out of your life an awful lot these days."

He looked at her with weary eyes. "What do you want from me, Eames? I'm trying not to make your life any more difficult than it is."

She sighed, frustrated. There was really no way for him to accomplish that. How the hell could she ever tell him she'd been about to leave Ricky when she found out about this baby? She had a feeling Bobby resented the baby as it was for securing the knot that tied her to Ricky. He would get over that in time, she was sure. But not if he knew that it really was the baby that was keeping her in this marriage. "Don't punish me because my husband is immature, Goren. Just let me handle him, all right? I can deal with his temper tantrums, but I can't handle your withdrawal."

"Can we talk about this later?" he asked, eyes scanning the desks around them.

Reluctantly, she nodded and turned her eyes from him. A few minutes later, Deakins breezed past them, touching Goren's shoulder as he did. "Now."

Goren got up and headed toward the captain's office. He didn't look at anyone.

Closing the door behind him, Goren turned to face Deakins. After what had happened last week, he was surprised to see concern and not anger on the captain's face. "What's going on, Bobby?"

"I...I don't know."

"Sit down." He waited then continued, "One death I can accept as coincidence, but not two."

Goren nodded. "I know."

"I do not want to interfere in your personal life, but what am I supposed to do?"

Goren looked at his hands for a minute. "I didn't kill them."

"I know that. But they're still dead, and you're the last one who was with them before they died. No matter how you look at it, you have to admit that it doesn't look good for you."

"Do you want my badge?"

Deakins was surprised by that. "No, I don't. Bobby, I will stand behind you. I always have. But we need to catch this bastard."

A dark look settled on the detective's face. "You think I don't want to get him? But we have jackshit to go on, Captain. The only trace at either scene is mine."

Deakins ignored his outburst. He needed to focus the man. "Would you say that whoever this is, he seems to be familiar with you?"

"I guess that would be a fair assessment."

"Any idea who it might be?"

"Not a clue."

"How did he know you would be with those women?"

Goren shrugged. "Logan and I go to a little bar in mid-town on Sunday nights. I...uh, I didn't know either of those women before that, Captain. Nothing was planned."

"Nothing but your visit to the bar. Is that routine?"

Goren nodded. "For the most part, yes."

The captain sighed. "Get Eames in here."

It was with a feeling of dread that he did as Deakins asked. Once Eames was seated, the captain said, "All right. We're going to run with the idea that Goren is the one being targeted here. Follow your normal routine, Bobby. Eames is going to be your pick-up Sunday night."

He felt as though he'd been sucker-punched. "No."

They both looked at him in surprise. "That wasn't a request," Deakins warned.

"Captain..."

Before he could say any more, his partner turned on him. "What do you mean 'no'?"

He met her eyes, his own gaze hard. "Eames, you're..."

Her eyes got wide and she shook her head. She wasn't ready to tell anyone about her pregnancy yet. Bobby and Ricky were the only ones who knew; she hadn't even told her family yet. She did understand his reluctance. But she wasn't going to let him get away with it...not this early in the pregnancy. "I'm your partner, or I'm not," she threatened.

He was torn, but he had enough sense to know this wasn't a battle he could win. It wasn't the undercover work he minded; he never did. This time it was the risk to a pregnant partner he wanted to fight, but couldn't. His hands were tied, and that made him angry. He hated feeling cornered. "Fine. Sunday, then." He met Eames' eyes as if daring her to object. "I'm going for coffee, and Logan's going with me."

He left the office and Deakins looked at Eames. "What was that all about?"

"That was personal. Don't worry. We'll work it out."

"See that you do. Today."

_If only it were that easy. _"I'll do my best, Captain."

* * *

Goren stormed out of the captain's office and motioned to Logan. "I'll be back," Logan muttered to Barek. 

He met Goren at the elevators. "What's wrong?"

He waved a hand as they got into the elevator. They were alone. "Eames and I have an undercover assignment."

"And you're upset? You like those assignments."

"Not this one. You and I are going out like we always do on Sunday, and Eames is going to be my pickup."

Logan was silent as the elevator doors opened and they headed out of the building. "Is there going to be a back-up team on stand-by?"

"Of course. And I want you on it."

"That's not a problem."

He looked at Logan. "I trust you, Mike. You won't let anything happen to her. I...I am not comfortable putting her in that situation."

"Oh? And who would you prefer to put in it? And if you suggest I dress in drag, I swear I'll punch you."

That got a smile from Goren. "No. I...I'd prefer not to put anyone in that situation. I was going to tell you that I'm not going out any more."

"Oh, that's gonna solve a lot. I can't deal with you being a hermit."

"Then what am I supposed to do?"

"Pick up Eames Sunday night and let her beat the shit out of the weasel who's gotten her stupid partner in such trouble. Then we can arrest him and everyone will be happy."

Goren laughed softly. He couldn't help it. Logan had a way of turning an untenable situation around and making it seem all right. But his partner was pregnant...and he couldn't tell Mike that...and it changed everything...but there was nothing he could do about it. Eames was willing to take the risk. He wasn't, but he had no say in the matter. It wasn't his child. So why should he care? Maybe he shouldn't but he did. She was his partner and his closest friend, and this was her baby. He would come to accept the child because it was her child, something she had always wanted. This baby would make her happy in a way no one else ever could. And _that_, ultimately, was all that mattered.

* * *

He was pacing the living room restlessly, the way he always did when he was agitated. Logan had offered to have dinner with him, but he'd turned him down. He wanted to be alone, and he'd come right home after work. He'd barely spoken to Eames over the course of the day, not because he was angry at her, but because he was furious with himself and he didn't want to turn that rage on her. After all, he was the one who had brought this all down on them, and now...

There were so many ways this could go south. They had no idea what they were dealing with here... Eames might very well get in over her head and by the time the team got in there it could be too late, for her and for her baby. He couldn't stay with her. He had to leave so the perp could strike... He would come back, but there was no guarantee that he'd make it in time. He had to trust her to Logan, and he felt okay with that...but he'd feel better if she were in his keeping. He trusted himself, more than anyone else, to protect his partner and keep her safe.

A knock at the door drew him from his troubled thoughts, which both relieved and annoyed him. He pulled open the door, surprised to see Eames in the hallway. She watched the confusion linger on his face. "Are you going to let me in, or are you just going to stand there and look at me like I'm a ghost or something?"

With a deep sigh, he stepped away from the doorway. "Why are you here, Eames?"

"Because my best friend needs me, and I am determined not to let him down any more."

"Any more? When did you...?"

"Let's not go there, okay. I know I have, and I'm sorry. Things...got complicated for me, and I became very self-involved. And then I got mad at you for making friends with Mike. That wasn't fair." She sat down on the couch. "Bobby, I will not let Ricky cost me the most important relationship in my life. So I'm here to fix it."

_A divorce court might fix it..._he chased that thought from his mind. That wasn't going to help anyone. "There's nothing to fix, Eames."

"That's why you haven't spoken to me all day?"

"I don't want to..." He paused to gather his thoughts. "This is my fault, and I'm angry about that. I didn't want to take that out on you."

"Your fault? How is this your fault?"

"How is it not? Apparently I am the reason those two women are dead. And now you...you're putting yourself into that same situation..."

"Knowing what's coming, yes. I will be prepared, Bobby, and we'll have back up. We'll get this guy. Don't you trust me? I'm not going to leave you, partner. Not ever. You got that?" Silence. "And I am not going to risk this baby either." She hesitated. "Do you care about that?"

"About your baby? Of course I do. This baby...is something you've always wanted. I can't begrudge you something that will make you happy. You should know that by now. Besides, it's not my place..."

She launched herself off the couch in one swift sudden movement, catching him off guard. Stepping close to him, she placed her hand against his lips. "Never tell me what your place is. If I ask you something, then it's important to me. Just accept that. Okay?"

He nodded, not quite able to get past the hand covering his mouth. Her touch was gentle, like her manner, and he crumbled. No one could get to him like she could. Her hand came away, and his brain re-engaged. "I don't want anything to happen to you," he said softly.

"I know. And I feel the same way about you. That's why I want to get this guy. I don't want this perp to cost you your badge. Do you know how much I would lose from my life if you weren't in it every day?"

"No, I don't."

Slowly she shook her head. "How can you be so good at reading people, and yet be so clueless about the people closest to you? You have to know that you're important to me."

"I do," he said softly. But he had no words to tell her what she meant to him, how lost he would be without her.

"It's going to be okay. We'll get this guy and it'll be over and done with. We'll have our perp and the answers we need. You tagged Logan for the back-up team, didn't you?" He nodded. "And you trust him, don't you?"

"I do trust him. He'll watch out for you until I get back."

"Which will take what? Ten minutes?"

"If that..."

She smiled. "Listen to me. I've given this some thought. I was mad at you for withdrawing from me and shutting me out of your life, and I blamed Mike for that. That was wrong. I should have discussed it with you. I'm glad you and Mike are friends. I think you're good for one another. He draws you out and you calm him down. Nothing but good can come from that. But I want you to understand something and make me a promise."

Apprehension clenched his gut. "What is it?"

She rested her hand on his. "Stop punishing me for getting married. Relax and be my friend, like you always were. I do love you, Bobby, and I always will. It hurts when you shut me out."

He closed his hand around hers and raised it to his lips, contenting himself with placing a soft kiss on the back of it. There was no way she could know how much she had hurt him, and it wasn't her fault. She had never meant to. He nodded. "I'll do my best, all right?"

"Don't worry. I'll remind you."

He let a smile touch his lips. "I don't doubt that."

"Come on. You can buy me dinner. Sunday I'm going to pull your ass out of the fire; it's the least you can do."

Finally, he laughed, and they both felt the tension subside. He pulled her close and held her in a warm hug. She rested her head against him and slid her arms around him. She had always loved his hugs. "Let's go, Goren," she said lightly. "This baby's ringing the dinner bell and I'm not too nauseous to eat at the moment."

He released her with reluctance and followed her out the door. "Italian?" he asked as he locked the door.

"No. Baby says Chinese."

He laughed again, feeling more relaxed with her than he had in far too long. "Chinese it is then. Whatever the baby wants..."

"Spoiling him already?"

Something about her question made him feel...good. He really wasn't expecting to have much to do with this baby. Ricky would probably see to that. But sometimes it was the illusions in life that made the rest of it tolerable. "Why not?" he responded with a smile as they stepped into the elevator at the end of the hall. After all, who else did he have?


	6. Decoy

Sunday came far too quickly for Goren's liking. He began getting more restless as the day drew closer, which both Eames and Logan understood. Eames, too, was feeling anxious for it to be over. She hated what this was doing to her partner. Now she was getting ready to leave for the midtown bar and Ricky was upset. "I don't like this."

"You don't have to. But it's my job."

"You don't work vice any more."

"This isn't about busting a pimp, Ricky. It's about catching a murderer who is trying to frame my partner. I know that doesn't matter to you, but it does to me, and it's my job, so get over it. I won't be home tonight. We'll be tied up with paperwork."

"Alex..."

She looked at him. "What is it?"

"Don't..." He stopped, thinking the better of telling her what to do, or in this case, what not to do. He didn't want her leaving on a bad note, not tonight. "Just be careful."

"I'll be fine, Ricky. We'll have backup and Bobby will be there. I'll see you tomorrow."

He watched her leave and he had to admit she was right. The fact that Goren would be there was reassuring. He didn't like the man, but he had no doubt he would do everything in his power to keep Alex safe. If anything happened to his wife, he would blame Goren, but he would also know that it would have been out of his control to prevent it. He left the bedroom and went into the kitchen. Taking a beer from the refrigerator, he went into the living room, put in a movie, and sat down on the couch, where he would end up spending the night.

* * *

Goren looked into his drink, liking this less and less as the evening wore on. It was getting late now, and Eames would be there soon. He had already talked to Gene, the bartender, and warned him to make certain to give him nothing alcoholic tonight, no matter what he ordered. He knew how to act intoxicated, and so did Alex. What they were getting her into troubled him deeply, but he found himself disturbed on a very different level by something she had said to him earlier on the phone. _You realize you're going to have to treat me the way you did Nancy and Cindy. I am not going to be Eames tonight. I'll be Susie._

The way she intoned the name of her cover had gotten him to laugh, for the first time in days.

_Treat her like Nancy and Cindy... _Oh, he could do that, no problem. And he'd have to, he knew. But just the thought of it was nearly enough to overwhelm him. He wondered just what level of Hell this was that he had stepped into and exactly what he had done to deserve being there.

When someone slid onto the stool beside him, he didn't react. He never did at first. He always let her take the first step, showing interest. He took it from there. "Hey there, big fella," came a familiar voice masked by a distinctly unfamiliar tone. "Wanna buy a thirsty girl a drink?"

He turned his head, not fully able to hide his surprise. She was a brunette, and he tried hard to hide his amusement. "I hate wigs," she muttered under her breath. "Rum and coke," she said with a sexy smile that made his breath catch in his throat.

He gave Gene a subtle signal, and Eames got a straight coke. She smiled at Gene and gave him a wink. He smiled back. The distraction gave Goren a chance to appraise her more fully. A short black cocktail dress and stiletto heels that brought her head past the level of his shoulder made his heart race. She had strong, sexy calves that he had never fully appreciated before. He wondered how well those legs would serve her in a situation like this, and the thought was chased away by his conscience. _She's married, dumbass. Married AND pregnant with his child...You're playacting; don't forget that...you really are not going to screw this date...damn..._

Her hand came to rest on his, breaking into his thoughts and drawing his gaze from her legs. She smiled at him, stepping fully into her undercover role, as always, but he saw the amusement in her eyes. "I'm Susie," she purred. "I'm a broker over on Wall Street. It feels so good to get out of those stuffy suits and have some fun." She slammed the coke and signaled for another. "How about you, big guy?"

Fully aware of the wires they were wearing, he played it safe. "I'm Bobby. I, uh, I work for the city."

"Ooh," she squealed, and he smiled, enchanted. "Let me guess. Ummmm, City Hall?"

"Guess again."

"Uh, a district attorney?"

His brow furrowed. "Do I look like a lawyer?"

He heard a stifled snort from nearby and he looked at Logan. "A DA...that's a good one," he laughed.

"Go away, Logan. We're talking."

Logan held up his hands. "Try to behave yourself, all right?"

He headed toward the far corner of the bar and slid into a booth where Barek sat with the two other members of the back up team. "Sorry," his voice sounded in Goren's ear over the small earpiece. "I couldn't resist."

Goren coughed, hiding his reply in his cough. Logan laughed. Then Goren turned back to the woman beside him and smiled. "Forgive my friend. He's just nosy. No, I'm not a lawyer. Want to guess again?"

She propped her head on her hand, elbow on the bar. "Give me a clue," she smiled.

"I do wear a suit to work."

She reached out and fondled his tie. "A suit for work and for play?"

He watched her hands and couldn't stop himself from wishing it wasn't his tie she was doing that to. "S-sometimes. I didn't bother going home to change tonight."

"So these are your work duds? Don't tell me you're a number cruncher."

"I'm not."

She pouted and he found that irresistible. "Come on, Bobby," she cooed. "How about a real clue?"

He mimicked her posture and met her eyes. She found herself caught up in the dark depths of his gaze in spite of herself. She was supposed to be attracted to him, and God help her, she was. "I carry a badge," he said softly.

Her face lit up. "Really? Let me see it. Please..."

He smiled. _God, she's good at this game._ They'd had many undercover roles, but none quite like this. Their married couple act was always playful and comfortable. This was...different. "I don't know..." he started.

She reached out and played with the lapel of his jacket. "Oh, come on," she pleaded.

"See if you can find it," he challenged playfully.

She knew very well that it was clipped to his belt, but if she went right to it, that would be suspicious. And she was supposed to be flirting with him...so, she started by patting at his pockets. He caught his breath, giving her a warning look that she smiled at. He had offered the challenge. He forced a laugh, made it seem relaxed, and moved his jacket to reveal the gold shield on his belt. She cooed over it and took it from his belt. "A detective? How exciting. You carry a gun?"

"Yes, but you can't play with that."

"Oh, come on...how can we have any fun then?"

He slid his eyes closed and she laughed, running her hand over his thigh. _All right, Eames, _he thought. _Two can play at this game._

He brought his fingers into contact with her knee, letting them trace her thigh and he heard her almost inaudible gasp. He leaned closer, caressing fingers playing along her leg. "But I do have handcuffs," he murmured huskily near her ear.

All the while they had kept up the pretense of drinking, and their flirting was knocked up a notch. He turned fully toward her and she let her fingers play over his chest and along his upper thighs as she cooed about the benefits of being a cop, how much she loved a man who could really take control.

And then, fully into the role, she leaned forward and kissed him, a full, passionate kiss. Her tongue slid into his mouth. His hands came to rest on her sides and he returned the kiss without even thinking about it. Against his mouth, she said, "My place is nearby."

"Let's go," he murmured.

Sliding off their stools, he dropped two twenties on the bar and followed her out the door.

As they walked down the street, she walked unsteadily, which wasn't hard to do on three-inch heels. "I'm such a lightweight," she giggled, leaning heavily on him.

For his part, he couldn't draw his attention away from her. His conscience had long since fallen silent. _It's probably in shock, _he mused. He knew he was. Then Logan's voice sounded softly in his ear. "Very convincing. I thought you were going to take her right there."

"Shut up," he muttered.

A soft chuckle. "I need to go find myself a date now," he laughed.

"This is serious, Logan," Eames said softly.

"Don't you go turning off your wires in that apartment," he warned.

"Pervert," Eames responded.

Goren buried his face in her hair and laughed softly. "I think you shocked him," he murmured into her ear.

She laughed, tightening the arm she had draped around his waist. It wasn't far to the decoy apartment, and he followed her up the stairs. She pulled out her keys, unlocked the door and turned into his arms, kissing him again. He backed her through the door and kicked it closed.

* * *

Once the door was closed, she stepped from his arms and he leaned against the wall, eyes closed. He'd brought this on himself; now every minute drew her closer to danger, and he had to stop thinking about that or he'd drive himself nuts. After a few minutes, he stepped away from the wall and headed to the bedroom, where he turned the light on and drew the curtains. Then he turned off the light and returned to the living room, where she had kicked off her shoes and tossed the wig on the coffee table. She shook out her hair and sat on the couch. He sat beside her. "Now what?" she asked. 

"Now we wait."

"What time do you usually leave?"

"Around four."

"Do you do any sleeping?"

He was quiet for a moment. "You don't want the details of my love life, Eames," he muttered, knowing how much he didn't want the details of hers.

"I'm sorry. I don't want to intrude."

"No intrusion. You just don't. Trust me. You've never asked; don't start now."

She was quiet. "You know what it's going to be like in the squad room tomorrow."

He cringed. "I know. But we were just doing what we had to do."

"And you didn't enjoy any of it," she stated, her tone light and teasing. She knew damn well he had enjoyed it, and she had as well. "Do you think the perp was watching?"

"Yes."

"And you think we convinced him?"

Logan's voice came over the wire. "Shit, you convinced _me_."

Goren smiled and shrugged. The truth of the matter was that they had been very convincing. The perp would have bought it hook, line and sinker. They had done their job with their usual thorough efficiency. Now they had to wait, to follow his routine. Pulling a deck of cards from his pocket, he said, "You like rummy."

She smiled. "Sounds like a plan." She held out her hand. "I'll deal first."

Returning her smile, he placed the deck in her hands.

* * *

Playing cards had helped to pass the time, but what made the time breeze by for him was the simple fact that he spent it with her. 

She gathered the cards together, slid them into their box and handed them to him. It was almost four. He slipped them into his pocket and finished his cola. Getting up, he took both glasses into the kitchen and set them in the sink. He was reluctant to leave because once he was gone, she was in danger. He wished they knew more about this perp. Maybe he'd feel better, though he doubted it.

He returned to the living room, surprised to find the wig back on her head. He sat beside her, laughing softly. She grinned. "You never told me how you like me as a brunette."

"Why did you wear that thing?"

"Stick with the pattern. The last two were brunettes. That seems to be your preference."

"Coincidence, Eames. I have no preference."

That wasn't entirely true. He had a definite preference, but she was beyond his reach. He turned away.

She saw the change in him and sensed his withdrawal. Turning off her wire, she reached under his shirt to turn off his. "Are you all right?" she asked.

He nodded. "Fine."

"Something is bothering you."

"I don't like this. I hate putting you in this situation."

"It's part of the job."

"I know. That doesn't mean I have to like it."

"You know we did what we had to do back in the bar."

He looked at her. "I know."

Then he shook his head. No, he preferred her natural look. Reaching toward her, he slid the wig from her head. "That's better," he said softly.

He tossed the dark wig onto the far end of the couch. Smiling softly, he smoothed down her hair. He found himself unable to resist letting his fingers toy with her stray locks. She closed her eyes, allowing herself to simply enjoy it. Studying her face and seeing contented pleasure, he gave in to an overwhelming impulse, leaning over and lightly kissing her neck below her ear. She gasped, which made him shudder and lightly nip her earlobe. She turned her head and he found her mouth, kissing her deeply.

She responded, sliding her fingers into his hair and parting her lips to welcome him. He groaned softly half a second before he came to his senses and suddenly pulled away, jumping up from the couch. He crossed the room and leaned against the wall. She saw him tremble and she left him alone, leaning her head back as she caught her breath. And she fought back tears. She was a fool...she had long known that she loved him, but she had never thrown passion into the mix. She had loved him with the heart of a friend. In August, she had realized that it was more than that. On his birthday, she realized that passion was a very real part of the love she felt for him. She had tried to find that with Ricky, and it just wasn't there. At one time she thought it had been, but she realized too late that whatever it had been, it had not been true passion. It was nothing like this. And the loss of this was something she felt deeply and mourned with all her heart. "Bobby?"

He turned toward her, his eyes guarded. But she knew him well, and before he could say anything, she spoke. "Please, don't apologize. It was...good. I'm the one who should be sorry, and I am."

"For what?"

She was not apologizing for anything she did. She was apologizing for what she could not do. Too late she realized her mistake, and now she was trapped by it. She had never even thought about cheating on Joe during her first marriage. And now that she realized her heart, she couldn't imagine loving anyone but Bobby. If he would allow it, she could see herself stepping into an affair with him. But there was no chance of that; he would never go for it. So things were the way they were, and he really did deserve better. He deserved more than she could give him. "Don't worry about it. Just accept my apology. Please."

He looked at his watch. "I'd better go. T-turn your wire back on, Eames. And I do accept it, for whatever you feel you need to be sorry for." He snapped his wire back on. Crossing to the couch, he leaned down and gave her a final, soft kiss. "Please, be careful."

He went to the door and turned to look at her. He was relieved to see her weapon in her hand. He left the apartment. "I'm leaving," he muttered into the wire.

"I told you _not_ to turn the damn wire off," Logan snapped.

"Why, Mike? Afraid you missed something?"

"Did I?"

"Leave him alone, Mike," came Eames' soft voice before Goren could reply to that.

"Remember what you promised, Logan," Goren warned as he headed down the stairs.

"Don't worry, man. We'll keep her safe. You know where the subway is?"

"Yes."

Silence fell over the wires as Goren exited the building. He headed away from the apartment toward the subway, unable to shake the feeling that he was leaving his partner behind for the wolves.


	7. Fog

The wire was silent. He knew he was still in range, but he heard nothing. "Eames?" he said softly.

"Nothing yet, Bobby."

"Mike?"

"We got nothing out here either. Assume you're still being watched. Maybe he's following you to the subway."

"I'm almost there."

Then Eames' voice caressed his ear. He fought down the jolt his body felt at the sound of her whisper. "Hold on a second..." He stopped at the entrance to the subway and waited for her to say something more. "Someone's at the door. Everyone get ready."

He heard a round chamber into her gun, and a lump formed in the pit of his stomach. Then, he heard her soft gasp. "Nicole," she muttered.

He froze. _No_. He _had_ to have heard her wrong. "What? Come again, Eames! Repeat!"

Her voice came back, more firm and filled with loathing. "Nicole Wallace."

She was not talking to them. He felt fear and panic grip him like a vise. "No! Mike, get up there now! Hurry!"

He turned from the subway stairs and headed back toward the apartment at a dead run.

* * *

When she saw Bobby's partner sitting on the couch, she was more than a little surprised. But she hid it well, allowing her hatred for this woman to overshadow any surprise she felt. "Detective Eames. I should have known." Her eyes flicked to the wig at the far end of the couch. "Playing brunette for him tonight? And you, a married woman." 

Eames got to her feet and stepped toward Wallace, keeping well out of her reach. She refused to react to the barb. "Bait, Nicole, to catch a rat. This wasn't about him or me."

"You're a poor liar, detective. I know what I see."

"Then your eyes deceive you." She frowned, continuing to buy time until Logan and Barek got there with her back up. "Why would you do this?"

"I was just having fun with him."

It took a moment for her words to register, they were so far into the realm of psychopathy that Bobby visited far too frequently. "Fun?"

Wallace seemed to sense that there wasn't much time. "I would love to chat, detective, but I have better things to do."

"You're not going anywhere, Nicole. You're under arrest for murder."

Wallace laughed, a chilling sound. "In your dreams," she cooed seductively. "And his, too, I daresay."

Eames always tried to predict her opponents, but with Wallace that was nearly impossible. She was full of the unexpected. Not even Bobby could predict her, and he came closer than anyone did to understanding her warped mind. Eames was prepared for a fight-or-flight response from her adversary, which was the expected response from a cornered animal, but when Wallace didn't move, she stepped closer, handcuffs at the ready. Wallace smiled. "Ever ready to protect your partner," she said bitterly. "He's so fortunate to have you."

Eames would never figure out exactly what happened. Wallace brought her hands forward in a pretense to be cuffed, but at the last moment, her right arm swung wide. Prepared, Eames began to move out of the way, but Wallace shifted her position. Eames' world exploded in pain and light as something bashed into the side of her head. As she crumpled to the ground, Wallace slipped out the door and vanished into the shadows.

* * *

Logan burst through the stairwell door into an empty hall with Barek and the two other detectives right behind him. He banged the apartment door open, weapon in hand. He felt his heart lurch and his stomach drop when he saw Eames on the floor, blood pooling on the carpet by her head. "Ah, no... Check the apartment and the hall. She's gotta be around here somewhere. And someone call for a bus." 

"Mike?" Goren's voice sounded through the earpiece. Logan could hear the panic in his voice.

"Uh, she's not here, Bobby. We never saw her."

"Eames?"

"She's unconscious." He dropped to his knees beside her, running his hands over her, looking for injuries. He found only the wound on the side of her head where Wallace had struck her. "She was hit on the side of the head. I can't find any other injuries."

Barek came out of the bedroom. "She's not here."

They got the same report from the search of the hall. Logan asked, "Did you copy, Bobby?"

"Yeah. Paramedics are on the way?"

"Yes. I'm sorry we didn't get up here in time."

Goren didn't respond, and that made Logan feel worse. He lifted Eames' head into his lap and held her as the rest of the team went searching for Wallace. Softly she groaned and he smoothed her hair back from her forehead. "Easy. We've got a bus on the way. She really clocked you."

"Eames?" Goren's voice was winded.

"I'm okay," she answered. "Just a headache."

"Take it easy and let the paramedics take care of you." He paused. "I'm going after her."

"No...not by yourself!" He didn't answer. "Bobby!"

More silence. Logan swore. "He turned off the damn wire again."

* * *

He continued to run toward the apartment. Whatever went down between him and Wallace, it was between them alone. Eames would insist he have back-up, but he wouldn't give her the opportunity. This had stepped beyond the official; this was personal. And he made his first mistake of the night: he was overconfident of his ability to arrest Nicole Wallace. 

There was no one outside as he approached the apartment building, and he turned into the alley that ran alongside it, eyes searching the shadows. He had no idea where she would go, so he followed his instinct. The alley dead-ended at one that paralleled the street. He turned left, where the alley ran toward a quiet side street, glancing between the buildings, left and right, as he went. He came out onto the side street, and stopped, breathing hard. He looked around, afraid she had gotten away once again. Then, half a block down the street to the left, he thought he saw something move. Hand on his gun, he headed toward the movement and turned into another small alley. The lights from the street only lit the alley halfway to the fence at the far end. He had to have imagined it. He was about to turn and leave when again he thought he saw movement, deep in the shadows. This time he was more certain. He couldn't see her, but he sensed she was there, the shadow of evil. "You're not going to get away, Nicole."

Several moments passed before she stepped out of depths of the darkness that surrounded her, smiling wickedly. "Hello, Bobby. How nice of you to come looking for me. I thought for certain you would rush to her side."

"She's being taken care of."

"I could have hurt her badly, but that was never my purpose for being here. You were the one I was after." Her smile was more of a sneer. "You should thank me for sparing her. I could have killed her."

He fought down his rage, but he couldn't keep the tremor from his hands. "Why hurt her at all, then?"

"She was in my way. You know I won't allow myself to be arrested again."

"You have no choice in the matter. You murdered two women and assaulted a police officer."

"I was just having some fun with you."

He had a hard time wrapping his mind around that. The taking of any life, in his mind, was not a game. That was one concept he couldn't quite grasp, a part of her pathology that eluded him. There were some aspects of the criminal mind, of true evil, that a good man would never understand, no matter how long he studied psychopathy or how well he understood those twisted minds. Those were elements of darkness that would always elude a soul that dwelled in light. They belonged only to the soul that was truly lost.

She moved closer and he tensed, hand still on his weapon, but he neither drew nor moved away. In a moment she was in front of him. Reaching her hand forward, she brought it to rest on his chest, and he made a lethal error. He let her. Slowly, her hand began to move, gently caressing, drawing abstract patterns over the muscles beneath his shirt. His eyelids lowered a fraction, and she noticed, gracefully stepping into him. His body was already wired and it took very little effort on her part to get a response from it. And she now confirmed something he had known for years: Nicole Wallace was a master manipulator who used her considerable skill to get what she wanted. And what she wanted right now was him. "_Le besoin biologique_, Bobby," she whispered. "Biological need."

His mind stopped working before he thought to step away, and then he had no will to move. When a soft, involuntary moan escaped from him, she smiled, delighted by his response. She had him and she knew it. But Nicole Wallace had never been one to let things just happen. She had one final dig to get in and so she did. Leaning in close, her face inches from his, she muttered, "I'll even let you play your game."

_Game?_ Her words failed to fully register through the pounding rush in his head. "What game?" he managed.

"You can pretend I am _her,_" she said, unable to keep a sneer from her voice.

_Her_...? Slowly the fog began to retreat from his brain. _Her...Eames..._ The only one who could always reach him, no matter how far away he wandered... Without any warning, he stepped back, beyond her reach on every level. As his mind focused on his partner, his anger at his adversary grew, and that anger calmed his body and cleared his mind. Nicole's eyes narrowed. "Tell me you felt nothing."

"There _is_ nothing."

"You-you responded to me!"

"Y-yes. Yes, I did. But that was purely a response to physical stimulation, nothing more. _Biologische Notwendigkeit,_ you said it yourself. Anyone could have gotten that kind of response. Don't kid yourself, Nicole. There is no emotion involved. No positive emotion, that is."

Her eyes blazed with fury. "Anger and hatred can ignite as much passion as love, maybe more."

He shook his head. "Not for me."

She was ready to explode. He reached under his jacket and pulled out his handcuffs, holding them out to her. "You know what's next. You can't believe this would end any other way, regardless of what transpired."

She laughed, and it was a cold, mirthless sound. "And you won't be surprised if I refuse to submit to you, Bobby, regardless of what I would be submitting to."

"There's no way out of it. Like my partner told you, you're under arrest, Nicole, for murder, and now, for assault as well. Don't make this difficult."

"I have no intention of making it difficult."

As he stepped forward, she reached out and pressed her hand into the middle of his chest. He grasped her wrist and pulled it away, bringing the cuffs up with his other hand. She took advantage of his distraction to bring her other arm forward. He felt a sting in his side, followed by a burning sensation that quickly became a spreading warmth. He pulled away too late. Nicole smiled as the handcuffs slipped through his fingers and clattered to the ground. "I'll be back," she whispered. "Never doubt that. You have not seen the last of me." She brought an empty syringe into his line of vision and dropped it to the ground. "Just enjoy the ride. Good-bye, Bobby."

She moved quickly away. He turned to follow her, but she had vanished as stealthily as she had appeared. His head was beginning to fade into a fog he couldn't fight off. He started toward the mouth of the alley, but the ground began to tilt and the world around him started to spin. He took a couple of unsteady steps toward the street, but he didn't get far. The ground wouldn't hold still, and then it was rushing toward him and he hit it hard. Turning onto his back, he looked at the buildings above him but they were moving in odd directions, rushing down toward him and then spinning away, dipping toward each other, then pulling back to reveal the inky sky beyond. There was no pain, and he didn't feel bad at all...but there was a darkness encroaching from the sides of his field of vision, and he let it come.


	8. Why?

**A/N: So sorry for not updating sooner. I had planned to update several chapters before Christmas, but I haven't had a chance to even get online for the past week. Whose bright idea was it to buy a house the week before Christmas anyway??? There is one last chapter to this one, and chapters almost completed for three other WIPs. Thanks for your patience and enjoy :-)**

* * *

After a brief argument, Logan left Eames with Barek to wait for the paramedics while he and the other two detectives hit the street, looking for Goren and Wallace. "Alex?" Logan said into the wire. "Does he have his phone with him?" 

"Yes. Why?"

"Because that's gonna be the fastest way to find him." He dialed and waited for Goren to answer, knowing on some level that he wouldn't, whether he was able to or not. "Of course he won't answer the damn thing. I swear, if he turns it off, I'll kill him. Warren, Chelovik, listen for his phone."

He dialed again as they headed off in different directions, listening intently for the sound of a ringing cell phone.

Logan turned down the quiet side street as Goren's line went to voicemail again. "Shit!"

"What is it, Mike?"

"Nothing. I just wish this damn thing would ring longer."

He dialed again. Then he heard the faint ring. He ran toward the sound, which stopped as he got to the opening to the alley. He shoved his phone in his pocket when he saw a form on the ground in the alley and ran toward it. "I found him."

"How is he?"

He dropped to his knees beside his friend. "He's unconscious..." He searched for an injury, but couldn't find one. "I can't find anything wrong, but he's barely breathing."

Eames' voice was worried. "Look for a needle mark. That's one of her M.O.'s."

Logan pulled a penlight from his pocket. "Would he have let her get that close?"

She made an odd sound he couldn't identify over the wire. "You're kidding, right? Bobby thinks he's invincible. Where are his cuffs?"

He shined the light around on the ground. "Oh, damn. There's a syringe on the ground right by his cuffs." He pushed Goren's jacket open and ran the light over his shirt. "Yeah, I got some blood on his shirt. Any idea what could have been in that syringe?"

"Not a clue."

Barek's voice came over the wire. "Where are you, Mike? The paramedics just got here; I'll send them right over."

"One street over to the west, turn north and we're in an alley."

"They'll be right there."

One paramedic stayed with Eames while the other followed Logan's directions to the alley. Logan looked up as he turned into the alley. "I don't like this," he muttered as the paramedic dropped to his knees opposite him. "I'm not sure he's still breathing."

The paramedic yanked out his stethoscope and listened intently. "He is, but only barely. Any idea what happened?"

He yanked his first aid box open as Logan answered, "Not a clue. He got injected with something by a suspect." He moved away as he pulled out a pair of gloves and snapped them on. Picking up the syringe, he carefully slipped it into an evidence bag, which he kept in his hand. He slid Goren's cuffs into his jacket pocket, then turned his attention back to the paramedic, who was talking into his radio. Logan only caught a few words—_apneic...bagging him...suspected drug overdose... _

He knelt beside Goren, still holding the evidence bag carefully as he watched the paramedic bag him to help him breathe. His eyes were dark with worry and guilt. "We'll meet you at the hospital. I have the syringe the suspect used, but I have to keep it in evidence. We'll turn it over to the docs in the ER. Where are you taking him?"

"St. Clare's is closest. They may transfer him from there, but that's not our call."

Eames' voice sounded in his ear, startling him. He'd forgotten about the wire he wore. "Mike, what's going on?"

"How are you feeling, Alex?"

"I'm all right. How's Bobby?"

"He's not all right. Hold on." He looked at the paramedic. "You taking his partner in, too?"

"Yeah. We can take 'em together. His condition doesn't seem to be deteriorating."

He turned back to the wire. "Where are you, Alex?"

"Just getting into the ambulance."

"Then you'll be heading over here to pick him up. You're going to St. Clare's. We'll meet you there."

Logan looked up as his partner's hand came to rest on his shoulder. He hadn't noticed her approach. Flashing red emergency lights lit up the alley seconds later, and he spoke into the wire. "That about wraps it up, boys. Paperwork time. Barek and I will be heading to the hospital to follow up on everything. We'll give Deakins a call. Thanks for the backup."

Not far away, Nicole Wallace watched the activity, well hidden in the shadows of a recessed doorway. After the ambulance left and the other detectives got into their cars and drove off, she stepped out onto the street and walked away, free.

* * *

Deakins stepped into the triage room where Eames sat at her partner's bedside, her head bandaged. "How do you feel, Alex?" 

"My head hurts, but I'm okay. They said it's a concussion, but not serious."

"And what do they say about him?"

"He's better. They're analyzing the residue from the syringe and running a tox screen on him." She shrugged. "Right now they have no idea, but he's stable. They're calling it a drug overdose."

"How did he let this happen?"

"The same way I did. We each confronted her alone and when we tried to arrest her, she lashed out. I think she meant this for him, though, right from the start. She was ready for him."

"Do you think she tried to kill him?"

"Who knows with Nicole. Whatever she gave him, he stopped breathing, but the paramedics were right there. She had to know we had backup. He's breathing all on his own now."

"I was told he turned off his wire."

A dark cloud crossed her face. "Yes, and I am going to seriously kick his ass for that. We have no idea what transpired between them."

"How'd you find him?"

"That was Logan. He kept calling his phone until he heard it ringing."

Deakins nodded. "That was smart. Where is Logan?"

"I think he and Barek went on a coffee run. It's been a long night."

"Are they admitting you?"

"No, but I am going to stay with him, at least until he wakes up and I know he's going to be okay. They're about ready to transfer him."

"I'll expect you to keep me updated."

"I will, Captain."

"And I'll deal with him when he gets out of here."

"I'm sure he's going to look forward to that."

He touched the bandage on the side of her head. "Are you sure you're okay?"

"I'm positive. She knocked me out, but it was only for a few minutes. She seemed angry but for some reason, she didn't intend to hurt me. I don't understand it, but I'm not going to complain too hard about it either."

"Maybe he'll have a better idea of what is going on with her. Call me when he's awake, and tell Logan and Barek I want to see them in the squad by midmorning."

"I'll tell them."

She watched him leave and then stood up and walked to the side of the bed. She ran her hand gently over her partner's hair and softly sighed, placing her other hand over his as she waited for them to come to transport him upstairs to his room.

* * *

An hour later, he was in his room and she was on the phone with her husband, who was relieved that she was all right. _Are you heading home?_

"Not yet. I'm still at the hospital. I want to make sure Bobby is going to be all right before I leave."

_You're sure you're okay, though?_

"Yes, Ricky. I'm fine. Just a little knock on the head."

_You're pregnant, you know. Did you tell him that?_

"Yes, he knows. I got checked out, Ricky. The baby and I are both fine."

_I worry about _you.

She let out a soft sigh. _Her_, not _them_...not the baby. "I'll see you tonight."

_All right. You sure you can drive? I can pick you up._

"I'll be fine. Mike already promised to drive me home. You go ahead and finish your shift."

He sighed. _Okay. Tell Logan not to drive like an ass._

She laughed quietly. "I will. Bye."

She breathed a sigh of relief. That had gone much better than she had anticipated. She thought Ricky would give her a hard time about staying with Bobby, but he hadn't. She sat back down in the chair beside his bed and rubbed her eyes wearily. _Nicole_ _Wallace_...they'd had no idea...she couldn't wait to see how he dealt with this one. It wasn't going to be pretty. She knew he was going to carry the burden of those two deaths, and none of them would be able to convince him not to. And Wallace got away again...that was going to be even harder to deal with.

A nurse came in every fifteen minutes to take his blood pressure and listen to his chest. She would give her a small smile, and then leave. Eames let her fingers caress his arm. "Why did you let her do this? Why do you always let her get to you, one way or another?"

"Talking to yourself now?"

She turned toward the voice. Logan approached the foot of the bed as Barek walked around to the other side. She stood silently, looking at him. He moved his head in a way that vaguely reminded her of Bobby, and that was it. Three steps and she was in his arms, which he wrapped around her as he glanced at Barek, confused. Barek looked sympathetic. At a loss over what else to do, he tightened his arms around her and placed a soft kiss on the top of her head. "What'd they say about him?" he asked quietly.

"Nothing yet." She sighed but didn't step away. "Why did he let her do this?"

"You know why. He doesn't think about consequences. He just walks into situations and he's damn lucky he doesn't have to say 'oops' a helluva lot more often."

He wasn't even going to get into Goren's state of mind. Part of the problem was that he was having trouble caring what happened to him. He had crossed the line sometime after the wedding, and Logan had been entirely unable to pull him back. He wondered if that wasn't part of the reason he'd turned off the wire. He was sure going to get it for that one, from _all_ sides. He knew better, yes. But he didn't care.

Finally, Eames stepped away from him. "What am I going to do with him, Mike?"

"Let me know if you figure that out." He sighed. "Just...keep reminding him that you care, Alex. He needs to hear that from you."

She returned to the bedside and looked across at Barek, who nodded in agreement with Logan. "He's right," she said. "And I don't say _that_ very often."

"No, she doesn't," he agreed.

Eames looked down at her partner. "I do care," she muttered. "Why doesn't he get that?"

"I can't figure him out. I just try to be there when he needs me, that's all."

She studied Logan, realizing for the first time that Goren did need him. Mike had been a good friend to him, and Bobby needed that friendship. "Thank you, Mike."

He shook his head. "No need. I'll be honest with you. I don't have any family, and neither does he, really. We've come to like hanging out with each other. Once I got to know him well enough, I found out I like him more than I ever thought I would." He held out a coffee cup. "Here. You look like you could use this."

"Thanks. Oh, Deakins wants to see you guys no later than midmorning."

Another heavy sigh and he looked at Barek. "I guess we'd better go face the music and get it over with."

Barek frowned at him. "What music? We didn't do anything wrong. There's gonna be an orchestra playing for Goren, but you and I are okay."

Logan looked at Goren, then at Eames, who had been partners with Bobby long enough to know guilt when she saw it. "She's right, Mike. You didn't do anything wrong."

"I promised to take care of you, and look what happened. Some back up."

"Mike..."

He waved an impatient hand. "Save it, Alex. Give me a call when you're ready to go home and I'll come get you. But let me tell you this: if we ever do this again, I'll rig his wire so he can't turn the fucking thing off. I'll see you later, sweetheart."

He headed out of the room. Barek looked at Eames and, with a small smile, said, "Don't think for a moment that my partner is any less work than yours. Call me tonight after you get home."

"Thanks, Carolyn."

She sat down heavily and sighed deeply. Shifting the chair up against the bed, she reached her arm over and grasped his hand, holding onto it as she closed her eyes to rest, just for a minute...


	9. The Heart of A Friend

The darkness receded, but slowly, much more slowly than it had come upon him. The fog, however, did not lift. He didn't feel badly, but he felt...odd. Even as a teenager, when he'd done some stupid things seeking an internal peace that still eluded him, he had never felt like he was feeling now. It was weird, but not in a troubling sort of way.

He opened his eyes slowly. The curtains were drawn and the room was dark and quiet, in spite of the fact that it was midday. His head was swimming and when he moved, his surroundings still tilted and spun, upsetting his stomach, so he stopped moving and softly groaned.

She jerked awake, not certain if anything beyond her throbbing head actually woke her. She sat up, gently sliding her hand from his so she could stretch. She heard a soft sigh and looked toward the bed. "Bobby?"

"Hey," he said softly.

She stood up and turned the light on over the bed, stepping to his side as he squinted against the sudden brightness. "How do you feel?"

"Pretty good," he answered. "How are you?"

"My head is killing me."

He reached up and lightly ran his fingers over the bandage on the side of her head. "I...I tried to get back."

"I know. But I am going to kick your ass for turning off your wire and facing her with no backup. You know better, dammit."

He was quiet for a minute, and she knew the look on his face. He was trying to put his thoughts into words. He had a reason for doing what he did, and he was trying to figure the best way to explain it to her. "I-it killed me to use you as bait, Eames. And the moment I found out it was her, I knew this was personal. I turned off the wire for the same reason I always have you leave the interrogation room. This was between her and me. I was not going to involve anyone else."

"It's not the same. In the interrogation room, you still have backup. I can still see and hear what's happening. When you turned off that wire, you cut yourself off entirely. That was a stupid move, Bobby."

He looked away. "It was bad enough she hurt you..."

She touched his chin and forced him to look back at her. "We're partners."

He opened his mouth to reply, but caught her eyes and fell silent. He wasn't going to argue with her. "I'm sorry...th-this should never have involved anyone else. Sh-she should never have done what she did."

"How many times have we said that? How many other lives has she taken? She's a psychopath, Goren. She doesn't care about anyone else. All she seems to care about is this power struggle with you."

"It's more than that...to her."

She frowned. "What does that mean?"

"Love and hate are the same thing to Nicole. She isn't capable of distinguishing between the two. She hates me, because she's more comfortable with hate. But on the other hand, she doesn't hate me. She can't mitigate that conflict, so she plays this game. Only her stakes keep rising."

"Do you know what she injected you with?"

He shook his head, instantly regretting the motion. "I have no idea," he answered, closing his eyes until the room stopped moving.

"They're running tests on the syringe and on your blood."

"Does it matter any more? I'm fine."

She studied him for a minute. "Sure. You look like you're fine. Now if I stand here and sway back and forth..."

"Don't...please..."

She smiled. "Yeah, you're fine."

"I will be. It's working its way out of my system." He sighed softly as he studied her. "You should go home, Eames. You need to rest, and that chair can't be comfortable."

"Bobby..."

"You're pregnant," he said softly. "It's more than just you now. Take care of your baby. Go home and get some sleep."

"Are you trying to get rid of me, Goren?"

_God, no... _He let his eyes close. _Never_. Forcing them open, he said, "You know better. I...I don't want you to go, but I know you have to. You don't need to babysit; I'm okay. Go home."

She studied him. It was about her taking care of herself and her baby. Ricky might not care about this child, but Bobby did, simply because the baby was hers. "Fine. But I'll be back in the morning." She took a deep breath. "Promise me you'll be okay."

"I promise,"he said with a nod.

That was the wrong thing to do. He closed his eyes as the room moved in odd directions again. When he felt steady again, he opened his eyes and turned his head to look at her at the same moment she chose to lean in to kiss his cheek. Instead of his cheek, her lips met his mouth. They both tensed, then slwoly relaxed. He left the kiss entirely to her, neither deepening it nor withdrawing from it. She raised her hand to his cheek and lingered longer than she should have, but at the moment she simply cared about him and letting him know that she did. When she withdrew, she left her hand on his cheek for a moment. "Listen to the doctors, Bobby. Don't cause any trouble."

He was still overwhelmed by her. "Trouble?"

"Yes, trouble. That's quickly becoming your middle name, you know."

Trouble...she had no idea... "How are you getting home?"

Leave it to him to remember her car was parked by the midtown bar. "Mike said he'd take me home."

He nodded, then leaned back into the pillow. Her fingers played across his hand and she turned to leave. "Eames?" he softly called before she had a chance to step away.

She turned back to face him, her face questioning. For a change, he didn't analyze what he was about to say, although on some level, he knew he was going to regret saying it. His voice still soft, he said, "I love you."

She knew he did, but she was still surprised to hear him say it. She wondered how much the drugs coursing through his system had to do with the fact that he said it. After a moment, though, she decided it didn't matter. She was certain he wasn't expecting a reply, but she felt compelled to give one. "I love you, too, Bobby," she answered, and she meant it.

The words came from the heart of a friend but they were felt with the passion of a lover. Their circumstances held pain for her as well as they did for him, whether he chose to believe that or not. She was so used to his ability to read people, she failed to realize he wasn't able, or maybe he just wasn't willing, to read that part of her. So she buried her feelings, certain he knew what they were. Turning, she left the room. He sighed, a lonely, miserable sound. Rolling over, he closed his eyes against the nausea-inducing movement, and he went back to sleep.

_Central Park, twenty months later..._

Nicole Wallace returned to the Big Apple from time to time, contemplating new and different methods of torturing her most cunning adversary, but she had thus far remained hidden in obscurity. Bobby didn't own the city. She had every right to be there, as long as she avoided any involvement with law enforcement. She was still annoyed by the trap she had stepped into nearly two years ago, laid by Bobby and his partner. And she still had difficulty forgetting the image of their act in the bar... wondering just how much of it was truly an act. Very little, to her mind.

Now she walked through Central Park, watching lovers stroll hand-in-hand in the warm summer air, children playing their carefree games, mommies and daddies playing with their little ones..._hello? What is this?_

She couldn't believe her eyes. She knew that leaving Bobby in that alley wouldn't have been the end of him. The drug cocktail she'd given him might have caused some respiratory depression...anesthetic medications and narcotics tended to have that effect...but the ketamine in the dose would have countered that to an extent. The dosage wasn't meant to be lethal.

She smiled at some of what had transpired in that alley. But her smile faded when she thought about his partner. She didn't doubt for a second that they would have gone looking for him. She snorted in annoyance. It would have made her life easier if Bobby had died, but the challenge would have gone from it as well. And she didn't want him dead, not yet. She would prefer to take him to bed, for the simple satisfaction of knowing she could, but there was always the aura of someone else in the way of that, and that knowledge caused her endless frustration, jealousy and rage.

Now...she sat on a bench and watched the big man out on the grass, playing with a little girl not much more than a year old. She watched his interactions with her and the way she responded to him. She didn't miss the smiles or the adoring looks. She had never seen him happy and content before. It seemed out of place with him. And she felt herself once more in the grip of a familiar raging jealousy, although she wasn't quite sure who to direct it at. She had no idea who the child's mother was, but there was no doubt in her mind that Bobby had a daughter.

_Don't count me out yet. _He had been right. She had always gotten a sense that he wanted to be a father, but she never thought for a moment it would ever come to pass, especially after Eames got married. Somehow, sometime around their last encounter, he had fathered that little girl.

An evil smile touched her face, twisting her features as she narrowed her eyes. _Daddy's little girl._ She watched the child toddle at him as quickly as her unsteady little legs could carry her. When she pitched forward off her feet, he caught her, and they both laughed. There were many forms of weapons, many forms of pain, and more than one way to defeat a hated enemy. In that little girl with the smiling eyes and the dark curls she saw something that had been eluding her for many years. She saw a sure way to once and for all strike a mortal blow at Bobby Goren.


End file.
